Megan Willome's Blog

Holy Cattle: Wendell Berry’s ‘Remembering that it happened once’

Over at Poetry for life we’re reading (and I’m memorizing) Wendell Berry’s “Remembering that it happened once,” a Christmas poem. Here’s my holiday poem about cattle.

Advent Calendar

The last members of the creche
(before Baby Jesus) are the cattle
his and hers
black and white
both sit in the stable, behind the fence,
they didn’t come with shepherds, with kings, with a man and a wife,
they were there all along,
chewing their cud
an...

De-Decorating and Hamlet

Over at Poetry for Life, we’re talking about Jane Kenyon’s “Taking Down the Tree,” which includes a reference to Hamlet. Here’s my poem about taking down my tree, which also includes a reference to that great Dane.

I, ClaudiusThe tree is down but still up is
the holly coaster, the Charlie Brown tree with
its dusty red ball, an olive wood nativity,
various holiday-themed mugs, Ho Ho Ho
socks since it’s still cold, playlists
I will continue to play even when my cardinals...

Peace, Love, & Comfort

The 8th Street Market brings together something old and something new, with a dash of blue.
by Megan Willome

Sometimes Robin Morgan sees a bride getting photographed beneath the words “Peace, Love & Comfort,” painted on the side of her building that houses The 8th Street Market. It’s the ultimate moment when the something old that is the shop’s antiques and the something new that is a woman in love come together. (And the word Comfort is even written in blue.)

That’s what ...

Kimberly and Blake Batson, Wacoans of the Year, 2023

by Megan Willome

Waco isn’t the mythical land of Narnia, but many of us can remember a time when the city was stuck in always-winter, never-Christmas. Downtown was not dead, but it was certainly frozen.

Baylor students left town on weekends and as quickly after graduation as possible. Tragedies happened.

The spell began to break about a decade ago, with the help of a little TV show called “Fixer Upper.” Suddenly, we remembered the beauty of th...

Hidden Treasures

House Wren makes old things new again
by Megan Willome

You never know what’s in a drawer.

Nancy and Mike Clark had bought an old, iron medical cabinet. After scrubbing out the rusty, brown water and grinding open the nuts and bolts, they found a treasure — $2,000 in bills from 1936. The Clarks posted a picture online, reminding people to “clean their old pieces.”

Making new treasures from old finds is the focus of the Clarks’ shop, House Wren. Located in a metal barn on Highway ...

Comfort in Details

Three friends share a passion for preservation in Comfort & Center Point
by Megan Willome

Almost 50 years ago, Ed Story was living and working in Vietnam and Thailand, when he got a hankering to find a piece of Texas to call his own.

“I came here in ’74 to buy a bit of land,” Ed said. “Every day I’d drive out 100 miles, looking.”

Ed says that back then Fredericksburg was actively preserving its historic buildings, but Comfort was not. Much of the town was boarded up. He found ...

My Little Poem: Night

Over at Poetry for Life, we’re reading Lord Byron’s “She Walks in Beauty” and learning it by heart. My post is about Kristin Lavransdatter, how she is a woman who walks at night, which is something she and I have in common.

This sentence from page 27 of this 1124-page book is my inspiration:

But she couldn’t do that here, for she was constantly noticing things in the dark.”

Here is my haiku, inspired by Kristin and good ol’ George Gordon (aka Lord Byron).

I notice only
in t...

My Little Poem: Beauty

Over at Poetry for Life, we’re reading Gerard Manley Hopkins’ “Pied Beauty” — my latest poem to learn by heart. Hopkins’ poem is also in my first book, The Joy of Poetry.

Here’s my poem about beautiful things that might not appear beautiful to everyone.

White Dwarf Star

You have dwindled in size, now only slightly
larger than the globe in my study, spinning

on an axis uncalculable. Your red fuel
now spent. Compressed electrons share

expansive space – this poem, that song,
...

Poetry Pairs: Abigail Carroll’s ‘What Men Die For Lack Of’ the Malotte

Over at Poetry for Life, we’ve been pairing poems with things or people that mean a lot to us. I mention the friend who gave me Carroll’s collection Habitation of Wonder, when I was in need of a poetry pick-me-up.

The poem “What Men Die For Lack Of” is composed of lines from other poems. I decided to write my own poem, using lines or parts of lines or mashups of lines from poems I’ve learned by heart over the last several mon...

Poetry Pairs: “Some One” with UT Tower Shooting, 1966

Over at Poetry for Life we’re discussing poetry pairs. Because Walter de la Mare’s poem “Some One” makes me think of a ghost, I wrote my own ghostly poem.

Homecoming

first, one is ghosted
and then the ghost’s work begins
close and protective

They sing, Don’t don’t you
forget about me,
reacclimation to

unseennesses happens
as quick as fall color
sheds its green cloak

– Megan Willome

I loved this book. As soon as I finished, I began reading i...